Utah Jazz 123, Washington Wizards 108
Q. I know it was a loss, unfortunately, but your first game as head coach, how did it feel?
BRIAN KEEFE: Yeah, it felt okay. I thought the guys, what I was very proud of our guys, was that we didn't shoot the ball very well tonight, and we competed, though. We had multiple runs, a run at the end of the first, a run at the end of the second and a run at the end of the fourth where we were down, and our guys kept fighting and they did that without making shots, and that can be energy-draining at times.
So the competitiveness was there. But I think it was just the bar we set for each other as an organization, as a group, the bar was good. But that's just the first step. So we've got to keep going.
Q. Before the game, you were talking a lot about growing as a team and getting better defensively and competing better. When Marvin Bagley steps in off the bench and has a very solid performance like he's done multiple times already, does that maybe entice you a little bit more to play a two-big lineup with Gafford going against another two-big lineup?
BRIAN KEEFE: I think everything is always on the table. We are still learning our group, and we talked about really being in a discovery phase to really use the lineups that we have.
Marvin has been a great addition for us. He's given us a great spark. So we are thrilled to have him and he's given us something we haven't really had, a guy who can really offensive rebound, could score and he's showing some good stuff on the defensive end, protecting the rim.
So I think all that stuff is definitely on the table but I was pleased with our process tonight. We didn't shoot the ball well. I think we had 33 assists and we only made seven threes. So like that's good. We played at the pace that we wanted to. If we made those shots, it would have been right there.
But again, I was proud of our resilience within the game. That was really important to me tonight.
Q. How did you address the guys today? When did you first get to talk to them? Are you a big pregame speech guy? What's your style there?
BRIAN KEEFE: I talked to the team in the afternoon as we usually would like in a back-to-back situation. We were just open with each other. I'll leave some of what we talked about as a group in there because I think that's important to protect our locker room and what we're doing.
But we talked with raising our standards and we talked about competing, and I really believe I think I saw that tonight. Even when it didn't look right offensively because we were missing shots, we kept competing, and that has to be the bar for us going forward. It's really important for us.
Q. You called a time-out, 1:07 into the game.
BRIAN KEEFE: I did.
Q. Why?
BRIAN KEEFE: They got a layup in transition defense, and that is something that cannot be what we're about. And they needed to feel that from me right away. And that's the bar we've got to set, and they accepted it, and they understand what we're going to be doing going forward. But that stuff is not going to be tolerated.
Q. Was it even worse that it came off a made basket?
BRIAN KEEFE: Of course. Of course.
Q. Can you fill us in just a little bit on your background? When was the last time you were the head coach for either a game or an exhibition game or Summer League?
BRIAN KEEFE: Oohh, Summer League, probably. Long time ago in Oklahoma City. I had a pretty good starting backcourt. I had Russell Westbrook and James Harden and Serge Ibaka out there playing. We did pretty good. It was two MVPs in the backcourt and a guy who led the league in shot blocks for like five or six years on the court together. I think that was the last time.
Q. Is that something that's similar to riding a bike where you never quite lose -- it doesn't feel foreign to you when you're back on the sideline in that role? Does that make sense?
BRIAN KEEFE: I think so. Look, today I was focused on our group and trying to get the best out of our group. I tried to take myself out of the he quake, even though there's a lot of emotion going on with me. I'm the steward and the voice that gets in front of the media but I'm part of the group, too. I felt like my responsibility today was to uplift us and to get us into a level of competitiveness that has to be the standard and bar.
Yes, I probably will think about it at some point that I actually was coaching the game tonight, but I have bigger responsibilities than that now. I have to think about the group.
Q. The Jazz were kind of going in and out of the zone a little bit, especially in the first half. I know you mentioned just missed shots contributing to a lower scoring night.
BRIAN KEEFE: Yeah.
Q. But how do you feel, like, the guys did responding to that zone and when they were going in and out of it and the quality of looks?
BRIAN KEEFE: I thought our looks were great. I thought we figured -- I thought we had a little stagnation maybe early and then we figured out how to get into the teeth of it, and then I felt like we got good shots. If I go back on it, I thought our process was good. We had some little floors in the lane we missed. We missed some wide-open threes, but I felt like our process was pretty good, as you can see even by our assist level. Like our guys were doing the right thing. The shots just didn't go in. So we are going to live with that but I felt like the process was good.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports